How the U.S. lags peer nations in health care 2

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I came across a 2015 study by The Commonwealth Fund that shows the Americans spend more on health care, use more medical technology and take more prescription drugs than citizens of most peer nations, but aren’t necessarily more healthy.

We’re not the worst in this respect, but we’re far from the best.

The charts above and below tell the story. I doubt things have changed much since 2013.

I think that some things can be improved by better health care legislation—for example, by substituting a single-payer system for profit-seeking insurance companies and by negotiating lower drug prices.

Others are a matter of culture and medical practice. Japan has much the same system of paying for health care as Germany and France, but the figures on the chart show spending patterns are very different.